Violence At Chalo Tank Bund Rally, Many Hurt

The "Chalo Tank Bund" protest of the TSRTC employee unions' JAC on the 36th day of the RTC employees' strike today, supported by most major Opposition parties, turned violent as some of the protesters, including women, were injured in a lathicharge near Tank Bund.

The protestors, mainly RTC employees and their family members, and a few activists of Opposition political parties, had congregated for the JAC's "Million March" program at Tank Bund (though many people said that it was unclear how the JAC thought it would assemble a million persons for the protest when the common people have almost no sympathy for the employees and the striking employees themselves number no more than 49,000). The police had denied permission for the protest.

The area turned into a battleground as some of the protestors attacked the police who tried to turn them back. The angry RTC employees tried to surge ahead shouting slogans all through against Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao for "forcing" the strike and the failure of the talks, and despite the barbed wire barricades put up by the police, some 200 protestors broke into the Tank Bund road. When the police They used tear gas and lathi-charged them to send them back, they used foul language against the police, and pelted stones at them.

There were reports that the police chased away workers and local people even near Liberty, Domalguda, Himayat Nagar and other areas adjoining Tank Bund. Even media persons were caught in the crossfire as the police reportedly lathi-charged a few of them, too. And in the Liberty area, the police invited the wrath of the locals people when they wounded a worker of Jani Hotel who was not related to the RTC protests.

The police arrested leaders at various places, including V Hanumantha Rao of the Congress, K Laxman of the BJP, Thammineni Veerabhadram of the CPM, M Kodandaram of the TJS, BJP MP Bandi Sanjay Kumar, JAC Convener Ashwatthama Reddy, Vimalakka and others.

Earlier, the police had taken into preventive custody some 2,000 RTC employees and others.